Posts

Following on from yesterdays post on checking out the eZ Admin Interface prototype I've created an extension that can be easily downloaded, installed and enabled.Download the extension from hereCopy to your extension directory and untar:

tar xzf admin2prototype.tgz

Enable it in your admin siteaccess by editing settings/siteaccess/site_admin/site.ini.append.php and adding:

[ExtensionSettings]ActiveAccessExtensions[]=admin2prototype

Clear the cacheTo disable, simply remove the settings from step 3 above and clear the cache.

Note: If you enable the extension via the admin interface (Setup -> Extensions) this will effect all site accesses including your front end ones.

Things to check out in the prototype:Lack of Shop and Design tabs - these are disabled by default in eZ Publish 4.3Hidden right menu. Click on the [+] to expandContent menu (Left Hand side under Content, Users & Media Tabs) can be variably sized. Grab the bottom right hand corner and drag to desired sizeDifferent co…

The Admin Interface Refresh project has had a concept implemented that can be reviewed live with an eZ Publish install. This is a guide on how to get things working.

The new Admin Interface design is a prototype and it's constantly being refined so don't try this on your production servers.

Starting from a clean install of eZ Publish 4.2 with the the eZ Flow package (with content)Change into the design directory # cd designCheckout the design# svn co http://pubsvn.ez.no/nextgen/trunk/design/admin2Edit settings/siteaccess/admin_site/site.ini.append.php and change the SiteDesign to admin2[DesignSettings]SiteDesign=admin2Grab new menu.ini - this is required to display the left hand menus under Setup and My account.# cd settings/siteaccess/admin_site/# wget http://pubsvn.ez.no/nextgen/trunk/settings/menu.iniClear the cacheYou should now be able to view the new interface and it should look something like this:

To revert back to the original interface:Remove the menu.ini from the ad…

The eZ Publish winter conference is a free conference being held in Geneva on 21st and 22nd of January 2010, with the Community Day being held on the 22nd.

If you are like me and can't make it there is some exciting news! eZ Publish's Community Manager Nicolas Pastorino has setup a Ustream account for the eZ Community and scheduled a event for the community day.

I've covered two larger topics in other blog posts (Admin interface users & Dashboards) so in this post I'm going to cover a number of smaller suggestions I have for the Admin Interface refresh.

Some of the items have been suggested by others and been added to the specification - I hope I've noted these.Improve underlying HTMLDamien has already mentioned linking labels with their related input via the for attribute. I wasn't aware that there was already an issue for this but I made a start of adding a Accessibility & Usability Improvements project that currently "associates labels with specific form elements, adds "required" class to required input elements to allow attachment of javascript validation".

In the preface to the current Admin interface specification the last paragraph caught my eye:A overview of user task need a dashboard, where she can follow here own content, approval and other tasks she might do on a regular basis.I recently saw a demo of the latest version of the bug tracking system JIRA 4.0 by Atlassian. It used an OpenSocial dashboard to allow users to customise their homepage to access and interact with information that was important to them. The system not only displays JIRA widgets but any OpenSocial widgets (and those from other Atlassian products). You can check out a video of it in action here and more information on how Atlassian is using OpenSocial here.

What is OpenSocial? From the official site:OpenSocial defines a common API for social applications across multiple websites. With standard JavaScript and HTML,
developers can create apps that access a social network's friends and update feeds. Google personal home page is an example of an OpenSocial da…

It's been a while since I first posted about the Admin interface redesign that will be part of the eZ Publish 4.3 (due 30 March 2010). Since that time there have been some great input (here, here, & here) from the eZ Publish community as well as a transparent and inclusive design process from eZ Publish.

In moving forward with any changes I believe that it's important to understand the users of the system and the tasks they are attempting to carry out. This allows for suggestions and potential changes to be "tested" against a rule of "How does this help [ROLE] complete task [TASK]?"

In my experience users of the Admin interface can be split into two broad groups:Content editors, whose role is to …